Count me in as someone who drives a car (but also pays more to ride a bus, largely for ideological reasons) but would welcome a large hike in gasoline taxes. Take some time to phase them in, of course. But we would reap so many health, environmental, and ultimately economic benefits from driving less that I think it's one of the most important changes we could make to our tax code.
A tax with no alternative is not the way to change that behavior. So you tax people out of being able to afford to get to work or to the store to buy necessities, how is that helping? We've been through this many times before, but not every part of the country is set up for mass transit nor is it feasible. So higher taxes are just punitive to the people who live and work in those areas.
I think what the pot legalization would do is allow sellers to do it legit and full time. Undergrone is easy for the buyer but not so easy for the sellers.
Re: Mortgage Deuction - why not redo it to phase out the benefit out for the high earners while keeping it for the middle class?
I'm fine with the health ins. this so long as we are all fine with switching to UHC. I dunno what other outcome we could expect from that.
I'm fine with the gas tax so long as there is an eletric car infrastructure in place for everyone to transition to.
Count me in as someone who drives a car (but also pays more to ride a bus, largely for ideological reasons) but would welcome a large hike in gasoline taxes. Take some time to phase them in, of course. But we would reap so many health, environmental, and ultimately economic benefits from driving less that I think it's one of the most important changes we could make to our tax code.
A tax with no alternative is not the way to change that behavior. So you tax people out of being able to afford to get to work or to the store to buy necessities, how is that helping? We've been through this many times before, but not every part of the country is set up for mass transit nor is it feasible. So higher taxes are just punitive to the people who live and work in those areas.
Hence the phase in to allow both time and economic motivation for alternatives to be developed - especially by innovative private industries. But I don't think you and I are ever going to agree on this.
I also don't think middle class home ownership is something our country needs to necessarily encourage.
Hey, if less people owned their residences, it would be easier to move to urban centers with public transit. Hey-o! Two birds with one stone.
I agree.
I'd rather see more targeted incentives - eg one time tax credit for purchasing homes in areas where economic development and middle class consumer dollars are desperately needed - than long term subsidies going to everyday housing expenses financed by people who can't afford to buy.
I'd be cool with a consumption tax instead of an income tax provided food was exempt. As much as I hate to say it though, I think we could tax certain foods.
I'm not sure I can articulate why but while I don't approve of taxing "bad foods" now, I wouldn't take issue with putting a tax on certain foods if we're in an environment where food generally doesn't have a tax.
Or perhaps even a tax structure for food. i.e. produce, meat, and straight forward dairy aka, the edges of the supermarket are tax free. Prepackaged foods are taxes at x%, foods with very low nutritional values at y%, and wine, beer, alcohol, and fast food at z%. But that's probably too much work.
I'm not a fan of increasing taxes on gas unless or until there is a widely available alternative. I think this idea could be implemented on a local level but would harm many areas of the country were it implemented across the board. There's no reason this couldn't work in urban areas like NYC for example and every reason why this is a spectacularly shitty idea for small towns in Texas.
I'm probably dense and/or this is some kind of principle I don't agree with but what's the issue with people living in less urban areas aside from the lack of public transportation?
Count me in as someone who drives a car (but also pays more to ride a bus, largely for ideological reasons) but would welcome a large hike in gasoline taxes. Take some time to phase them in, of course. But we would reap so many health, environmental, and ultimately economic benefits from driving less that I think it's one of the most important changes we could make to our tax code.
A tax with no alternative is not the way to change that behavior. So you tax people out of being able to afford to get to work or to the store to buy necessities, how is that helping? We've been through this many times before, but not every part of the country is set up for mass transit nor is it feasible. So higher taxes are just punitive to the people who live and work in those areas.
I thought you didn't like it when people used, "it's not fair" as an argument against a policy?
Keep in mind though that people in rural areas are often heavily subsidized by everyone else. Things like bridges, roads, power lines, etc are paid for on a statewide or federal basis, and not by the people who live and use those resources. A new highway in the SF bay area is going to be used by a lot more people than a new highway in BFE California, making a new highway here a more efficient use of tax dollars. Unless people in BFE areas want to pay a higher tax for the extra long stretches of roads and bridges that connect them to hospitals, airports, business, etc, than I do, then I don't see a fairness problem in forcing rural people to shoulder a larger portion of one kind of transportation tax, when they are shouldering a smaller portion of another kind.
So there are no benefits to having people live in more rural areas?
I promise I'm not being deliberately obtuse. I just grew up under the though process that people needed to get the fuck out of more urban areas in order to have a better chance at better resources, including education, nutrition, etc. But this is likely only the case when you're talking about really urban areas like Newark, Camden, Brooklyn, etc. So idk.
So there are no benefits to having people live in more rural areas?
I promise I'm not being deliberately obtuse. I just grew up under the though process that people needed to get the fuck out of more urban areas in order to have a better chance at better resources, including education, nutrition, etc. But this is likely only the case when you're talking about really urban areas like Newark, Camden, Brooklyn, etc. So idk.
I'm not sure anyone said that there were no benefits to sustaining rural populations. At a minimum, farming and agriculture are a matter of national security. That said, having grown up in a rural area, I wouldn't raise my kids in one because, among other things, when you have disposable income and choices, then there's better resources and education in some urban areas. But there's a huge difference between SF bay area and Newark.
Anyhoo, my point was simply that, generally speaking tax dollars are more efficiently spent in urban areas. Imagine the difference in piping water and sewage when you've got people living on quarter acre plots of land versus 1 acre plots of land versus 3+ acre plots of land. That doesn't mean we should kill all the rural populations, or create economic incentives for everyone to abandon Iowa. I just think it's silly that Pamela is complaining about one tax policy that disproportionately hurts rural populations, when so many others -- like infrastructure -- disproportionately help them.
I don't see how it's silly when newark aside, rural areas are already hurting financially on an individual household level. Taking a low income area and saying, here, pay more for gas just seem a little odd.
hab - part of the idea is that encouraging people to move back into urban areas would actually help get better resources in areas like that.
Suburbs are almost always more resource intensive than city living. Tearing up farmland or woodland to build subdivisions has obvious issues. All the extra people fertilizing and watering their lawns leads to increased water use and increased run-off. More people driving from the burbs into the city for work means more gas, more emissions, more wear and tear on vehicles (so we need to buy them more often), more pavement for more lanes means more stormwater runnoff, we have to ship more food and other items to more areas since people aren't in concentrated locations.
It's not that rural or suburban living is bad in general - it's the growth of the ridiculous suburban sprawl surrounding most of our major cities. If these people work in the city, it's so so much more efficent to encourage them to actually live in the city. If it wasn't so cheap to just drive that 45 minutes each way every day it helps convince people to do that. The more people with resources who want to live in the city, the better property values get, the more demand and action there is for better grocery stores, safer neighborhoods, better schools...you get the idea.
It's not really about joe farmer, or even sally the school teacher at the local elementary - but about the thousands of city workers who commute in and out every day. and yes, it'd suck for people who have no choice about moving for whatever reason. Change sucks.
I don't see how it's silly when newark aside, rural areas are already hurting financially on an individual household level. Taking a low income area and saying, here, pay more for gas just seem a little odd.
Look, I didn't say that I'd favor the policy being put in place tomorrow. Like others have said, anything that dramatic would need to be rolled out gradually to hopefully allow for people to adopt, other changes to be made, etc. And urban areas are hurting too.
My point was simply that Pamela, who sparked a 10 pager about how liberals are stupid communist morons because their parents clearly never taught them life isn't fair, complained that a tax policy that unfairly burdens one group of people isn't fair (while ignoring all other tax policies that favor that group of people). I wasn't commenting on the merits of the proposal.
Okay but charging those rednecks down the street more for gas isn't going to enable them to afford to move nor is it going to make jobs available to them if they move.
If you're pooh poohing the suburbs, planned developments, gated communites, etc, I get it (some) but I just don't think this thought process works for more rural areas, particularly in red states.
I'm not sure why but this feels very much like WPP.
Saying change sucks sounds rather flippant and ivory towerish, tbh.
Okay but charging those rednecks down the street more for gas isn't going to enable them to afford to move nor is it going to make jobs available to them if they move.
If you're pooh poohing the suburbs, planned developments, gated communites, etc, I get it (some) but I just don't think this thought process works for more rural areas, particularly in red states.
I'm not sure why but this feels very much like WPP.
Saying change sucks sounds rather flippant and ivory towerish, tbh.
It was flippant. But it's true. There is not a single change that could be made to our tax code that won't suck for SOMEBODY. So obviously we should do what we can to mitigation the suckage, while aiming for the most increased benefit for each change we make. But saying, "well that's not good for this one group of people" as a standalone reason not to do something is only half the equation.
Ok, yeah, it'll suck for them. Stipulated. So what can we do to mitigate that effect, and is there a big enough benefit on the other side to do it anyway? It's not like I don't understand what it's like to live in the boonies. I grew up there where everything is a minimum 30 minute ride away and there is absolutely no transit options. And now I live in the burbs. So I'm not exactly saying this while riding the train to my green-roofed apartment building with my reuseable bag full of farmer's market arugula - just explaining the point of incentivizing urban living over suburban living. Rural living just gets the shaft in this particular equation. Might still be worth it...I'm not sure, I'd need to see a much more detailed proposal and analysis.
Eh, fuck it. Do everything they say. They're economists. I'm not. I really don't want to pay taxes on my pinko commie health insurance benefits, but sometimes we all gotta take one for the team.
I'd be cool with a consumption tax instead of an income tax provided food was exempt. As much as I hate to say it though, I think we could tax certain foods.
I'm not sure I can articulate why but while I don't approve of taxing "bad foods" now, I wouldn't take issue with putting a tax on certain foods if we're in an environment where food generally doesn't have a tax.
Or perhaps even a tax structure for food. i.e. produce, meat, and straight forward dairy aka, the edges of the supermarket are tax free. Prepackaged foods are taxes at x%, foods with very low nutritional values at y%, and wine, beer, alcohol, and fast food at z%. But that's probably too much work.
I disagree with this because it would benefit the wealthy more because they sped more money on food. With a prebate up to 3 times them poverty level you are covering basic food tax free. As you spend more and more money on nicer food options you have to pay a tax on it.
Another good thing about consumption taxes is that money that is obtained illegally to purchase goods is now taxes when currently illegal income is often not reported and thus not taxed.
Okay but charging those rednecks down the street more for gas isn't going to enable them to afford to move nor is it going to make jobs available to them if they move.
If you're pooh poohing the suburbs, planned developments, gated communites, etc, I get it (some) but I just don't think this thought process works for more rural areas, particularly in red states.
I'm not sure why but this feels very much like WPP.
Saying change sucks sounds rather flippant and ivory towerish, tbh.
Meh, I think it's a pretty shitty national policy to ignore the fact that an enormous portion of the US population's economic security is so fundamentally intertwined with one privately held commodity. I don't see how saying, "create incentives for them to move" is more flippant than saying, "they are dependent on gas, so let's not change that."
Okay but charging those rednecks down the street more for gas isn't going to enable them to afford to move nor is it going to make jobs available to them if they move.
If you're pooh poohing the suburbs, planned developments, gated communites, etc, I get it (some) but I just don't think this thought process works for more rural areas, particularly in red states.
I'm not sure why but this feels very much like WPP.
Saying change sucks sounds rather flippant and ivory towerish, tbh.
Meh, I think it's a pretty shitty national policy to ignore the fact that an enormous portion of the US population's economic security is so fundamentally intertwined with one privately held commodity. I don't see how saying, "create incentives for them to move" is more flippant than saying, "they are dependent on gas, so let's not change that."
there are also ways to try and help reduce the impact to people who we really do want to stay in rural areas. Like farmers. Say a tax credit for farmers where they can deduct the first $xxxx of dollars spent on gas, or for gas costs specifcally for running farm equipment or for bringing goods to market. I'm not sure how it would work, but I'd imagine something along those lines could be implemented along with the increased gas tax.
No, all I said was that jacking up the gas prices without some kind of alternative was probably a crappy idea and would likely create a different economic issue.
No, all I said was that jacking up the gas prices without some kind of alternative was probably a crappy idea and would likely create a different economic issue.
So we agree then. Most posters here said they supported a gas tax that was gradually phased in to give time for alternatives to be developed. I tend to think that the alternatives probably won't crop up if there isn't a need, and that gradually phasing a gas tax in over 5-10 years would create a market for other solutions to be developed and implemented.
A tax with no alternative is not the way to change that behavior. So you tax people out of being able to afford to get to work or to the store to buy necessities, how is that helping? We've been through this many times before, but not every part of the country is set up for mass transit nor is it feasible. So higher taxes are just punitive to the people who live and work in those areas.
I thought you didn't like it when people used, "it's not fair" as an argument against a policy?
I'd love to have the option to take reliable, frequent mass transit to work, but you don't want my work anywhere near large population centers so those two don't really work well together. And there are a large number of industries and workers like that. It would be a huge benefit to have mass transit options in a few months when we have 5000 workers trying to get on our site that normally has 500, but again, too far out for that to happen.
Tax the famer's gas that is needed to run equipment out the wazoo for what purpose?
No, all I said was that jacking up the gas prices without some kind of alternative was probably a crappy idea and would likely create a different economic issue.
So we agree then. Most posters here said they supported a gas tax that was gradually phased in to give time for alternatives to be developed. I tend to think that the alternatives probably won't crop up if there isn't a need, and that gradually phasing a gas tax in over 5-10 years would create a market for other solutions to be developed and implemented.
This! I had to leave for a meeting and missed quite a bit more than I expected, but isn't it a conservative cornerstone that the free market should be left to develop solutions given the proper incentives without government intrusion? I'm not sure why we're saying that the government should spell out the solution ahead of time in this case!
Also, people in lower economic tiers will be disproportionately harmed by climate change, so taxing carbon will actually help them in the long term.
So there are no benefits to having people live in more rural areas?
I promise I'm not being deliberately obtuse. I just grew up under the though process that people needed to get the fuck out of more urban areas in order to have a better chance at better resources, including education, nutrition, etc. But this is likely only the case when you're talking about really urban areas like Newark, Camden, Brooklyn, etc. So idk.
I think there's a big difference in the quality of city life now than when we were kids. Things like smog and other pollution, and even crime, are not as much of a threat. And there are more obvious benefits now than there were then.
If you look at urban areas in the 19th century - fuck no! No one wanted to live in a city. It WAS unhealthy. The London "fog" is really the smoke from the smoke stacks than used to blanket the city in Victorian Times. People lived in cities because they had to, not for fun.
After transportation became easier and people flew out to the suburbs and exurbs, downtown cores turned into business districts. And then people stopped visiting the businesses when they didn't have to drive into the cities. And then you had a lot of cities lose their urban core and populations.
Hence, there's more of a movement now for mixed use buildings. Living in cities allows you to use alternate transportation, of course - public transit, bikes, walking. It gives you a variety of educational choices, food choices (if you don't live in a food desert, which is another issue entirely), cultural choices. People who walk more tend to be healthier. People who live in cities also tend to live in smaller spaces than those who live in the 'burbs or rural areas. Both of these things lead to less consumption, and, ironically (given how "dirty" some people think cities are) a healthier planet.
Urban life is obviously not the right choice for everyone. My parents would HATE living in an urban area. But there are benefits. It's a trade off - it depends what matters more to you.
No, all I said was that jacking up the gas prices without some kind of alternative was probably a crappy idea and would likely create a different economic issue.
So we agree then. Most posters here said they supported a gas tax that was gradually phased in to give time for alternatives to be developed. I tend to think that the alternatives probably won't crop up if there isn't a need, and that gradually phasing a gas tax in over 5-10 years would create a market for other solutions to be developed and implemented.
But if you phase it in over that long, how is it any different than the impact now from the increase in gas prices without a tax increase? People just come to accept the new prices and it doesn't cause a drastic change in behavior.
mrsmery, perhaps in some areas, that's the truth but where I'm living now, newp, not unless you have the scratch to live in one of the more historic but not historically black areas AND have the scratch to send your kids to public school.
Or if you qualify for section 8 and win the magnet school lottery.